Vent: I absolutely HATE stupidity! Not ignorance.....STUPIDITY!!

Nurses General Nursing

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5-month-old baby sent from the clinic 10 miles away for a respiratory workup. Baby arrived in an infant carrier with a heavy furry blanket over him. Remove that blanket and find Baby resting on top of another one....with the seat's safety straps under that! After eval and treatment, as part of his discharge, I spoke with mom via an interpreter about the carrier and the child safety seat law. First the mom lies and says that she put the blanket under Baby when they got to the hospital. I confronted her on that and she just laughed. When I asked her if she knew what the law was, she was able to recite it. Her brother drove her and Baby to the ER and he tried to excuse it by saying "I'm a very safe driver."

I am so tired of the stupidity, and stupidity is just what it is. Just around Thanksgiving there was an SUV rollover, with a 2-month-old ejected and killed. Two older kids in the car were badly injured, as well as the grandma. The baby's mom was driving down the freeway, Grandma was in the back seat changing baby's diaper, and the two older kids were in seats but improperly restrained.

There is no excuse for this....in this county all medicaid moms who get prenatal care go through a program and get free strollers and corificeats, and they're taught how to use those corificeats.

How many more children have to die before this stops???

Specializes in LTC, assisted living, med-surg, psych.

It amazes me to think of how many ways I could have been killed or mutilated when I was a kid..........people just didn't think much about those things back then. They'd let us sit on the steps of the school bus.........ride in the back of a pickup going 80 MPH.........even lie on the back seat of the car on long road trips, with our feet up in the window! Not only that, we NEVER wore helmets while riding our bikes---I don't think they even made them then---and monkey bars were constructed on blacktop without a single shred of bark dust underneath, so if you fell off, you broke your arm and got all your classmates to sign your cast. ~tsk~those safety rules have taken ALL the fun out of childhood!!!:lol2:

Seriously, it's incredible how many stupid things we did a couple of generations ago that are unthinkable now. Not one of my kids has ever, to my knowledge anyway, ridden in a moving vehicle without a seat belt---and the car seat was a non-negotiable issue when they were little. My hubby and I were a bit resistant to donning seat belts ourselves, at least until one beautiful late-summer day in 1990 when we were taking a nice leisurely drive in the country, and only by the narrowest of margins missed being T-boned by some nut in a 3/4 ton truck barrelling out of a side road at probably 50 MPH.

When we finally got our hearts out of our throats and back down into our chests where they belonged some ten minutes later, we both realized how awful it would've been for the kids---who were safely buckled into their car seats---to survive a crash, only to be orphaned by their stupid parents who thought seat belts were 'too restrictive'.:trout:

It was the last time either of us ever failed to fasten our seat belts.;)

Specializes in FNP, Peds, Epilepsy, Mgt., Occ. Ed.
It is a crime where I live, and many other places as well. I am also a very safe driver, but how does that help me if some idiot decides to crash into me? Believe in your own immortality if you must, but for God's sake, protect your children!

I worked in PICU years back, and worked in a teaching hospital. Most of the seriously injured folks I saw, including children, were riding with good safe drivers. Unfortunately, these good safe drivers had encountered someone else who was not.

This is what I point out to people: You may be an excellent driver. However, you have no control over what the next person does. That may include looking down to change a CD, answering their cell phone, spilling hot coffee on themselves, arguing with their spouse, or driving under the influence of drugs and/or alcohol.

It's disheartening and dismaying and all I know to do is to keep educating.

Well said. Thanks

Specializes in Tele, ICU, ER.

I live in an area with alot of migrant workers who do lawncare and stuff. I can't tell you how many open-backed panel trucks or pick-ups I see loaded with equipment and loaded on top are 5 or 6 guys lounging across the mower, leaf blower or cuttings from the last job. In heavy, fast moving traffic! Good lord, if the truck stops suddenly or gets nailed by another vehicle, I'm not sure how the cops would match up which body parts go with which person! Do cops pull them over - NEVER. Oh and those open trucks also spew debris into the highway, for others to run over or run through other's windshields causing horrible damage or injury/death to some innocent driving to work. It's illegal but I guess if the cops pulled them all over, that would be ALL they did (and would that be such a bad thing?).

My kids and DH and I are NEVER EVER without our belts in the car and I cringe when I see unhelmeted bikers. If you love your harley, stay alive to drive it!

Specializes in LTC, assisted living, med-surg, psych.

My grandfather died many, many years ago, but I still remember his words of advice to my sister the day she got her learner's permit: "Drive like everyone else on the road is nuts."

They have served me well over 30+ years of driving, as I've had only a couple of tickets and never been in an accident.:)

Specializes in IMCU/Telemetry.

In Ireland, it is the law to wear seatbelts and motorbike helmets. It is very strongly enforced. When I came to the US I took the habit with me. I now always wear a belt and helmet, even if the law says I don't have to.

Enforce the law strongly enough it becomes habit. When it's habit, it's no longer a problem.

So the answer is get your local politico's to make strong laws and have them enforced.

Specializes in LTC,Hospice/palliative care,acute care.

There is no excuse for this....in this county all medicaid moms who get prenatal care go through a program and get free strollers and corificeats, and they're taught how to use those corificeats.

How many more children have to die before this stops???

I have not read the entire thread so this may be a redundant post.Sorry if it is but I'd like to point out that this type of stupdity is not unique to "medicaid moms" How many times have you heard about children left in cars "for just a minute" with a tragic outcome? How many times have you heard about small children getting killed by riding mowers? It goes on and on-and the way the parents is treated by the media correlates directly with their class...Upper class white mom can leave her baby in the back of her SUV while she is working all day -essentially roasting the baby- and "it's such a horrible tragedy-a mistake" Let it be a young black mother on food stamps and the media calls for prosecution....And time after time no one is prosecuted-as if the hurt the parents suffer mitigates the fact that a baby was killed....Getting behind the wheel drunk and killing someone and killing a child because you forgot it was in the car in high summer should both be murder,imho...

That's sad. What are people thinking? You're right, that's just plain stupid. I thinks it's a crime here in nystate. the brother could be the safest driver in the world but it is the other people on the road you have to worry about. I think states should do car seat checks to make sure the babies are strapped in the car seat and if the baby isn't then they get a ticket or get arrested and if it is a chronic thing then the child should be taken away for child endangerment.

consumer reports has recently come out with a study which claims that a high percentage of car seats are not safe even when installed as directed

this should be followed up per government...horrible if you put your trust into a car seat for your child and child is killed/hurt because seat was substandard

louisiana has recently come out with a helmet law for mortorcycle riders..my son and sil fussed and fumed but i had a hidden smile

my dgs, however, learned to unbuckle his seat and wave at policemen when he was just a toddler...he was very hyper, don't know how he lived to be an adult

I completly agree with the law requiring parents to safely secure their children in a vehicle. Any child under 18 in a car should be required.

I don't, however, agree with adult seat belt laws. I think they are just another case of laws overstepping their bounds. Now mind you, I am fanatical about wearing my seat belt and I won't start the car unless everyone with me is buckled up. That said, I also don't believe that the police or any other goverment body has the right to "make" me. If people choose to endanger their own lives in their own vehicle that is their right, they just don't have the right to endanger their children's.

As far as saving stupid people's lives, I'm all for a little Darwinistic thinning of the gene pool. There are far to many of them running around as it is(j\k).

I think that if you post a bond or demonstrate proof of insurance sufficient to make sure taxpayers don't have to foot the bill for care necessary for the unbelted motorists, or the support of his/her family, then you can do what you want in a car or on a motorcycle (helmet laws).

Or maybe there could be a check off box on your taxes similar to the one for election funding: $1 of my taxes should go to the care of idiots injured by their own stupidity. ;)

Florida is one of them.

I try very hard to stay away from motorcycles, especially if the riders are not wearing helmets. I realize that the riders might have the "right" to splatter their brains all over the pavement, I just would rather they didn't do it in front of my car.

Obviously, it would be a small splatter. :lol2:

I have not read the entire thread so this may be a redundant post.Sorry if it is but I'd like to point out that this type of stupdity is not unique to "medicaid moms"

I said "medicaid moms" because in this county they get detailed instructions in car seat safety as part of their prenatal care. I have private insurance and was religious about my prenatal care, yet our instruction was reading the booklet that came with the seat. I am not saying that medicaid moms are bad moms, I just meant that they are given instructions on baby and child safety seats that the rest of us are not, so there is absolutely no excuse for not using the seats properly. Read my original post again, especially the sentence about medicaid moms.

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